Safety
by White Aster
Summary: Punch trusts Jazz much more than he trusts himself.


bPrompt:/b Punch/Jazz (G1) - "Starting to lose myself"

Punch's sensors swore that the warehouse was deserted, as usual. As usual, Punch knew that it wasn't deserted at all.

That was ok. He knew this ambush was coming and drove happily into it.

Well, part of him did. Another part of him was snarling and grumbling, but that was a fight already over, or Punch wouldn't have even approached the warehouse.

And so, when Punch transformed to kneel on the warehouse floor, it was into PUNCH, and it was easy for him to toss away his 'launcher and to transform out and toss after it the power pack to his photon cannon, just for good measure. The knives and garrote were next, pulled from their secret compartments and flicked to spin away on the concrete floor. Then he locked down his subspace, popped the panel protecting his dorsal cranial port, put his hands on top of his helm, and stated to the not!empty warehouse, "I have nothing to declare but my genius."

The codephrase echoed off into the shadows, and Punch didn't sense so much as a whisper or a current of displaced air before a jack slotted into his cranial port seemingly out of nowhere. A cage of virtual steel fell on Punch's limbs, his motor functions locked, his firewalls so much tinfoil against his controller. His controller, whose access was so high-level that he masked his own presence, leaving Punch with the usual, highly-uncomfortable sense that his coding was disabling him seemingly of its own accord.

Punch waited as the barely-there ghost sensation of someone riffling through his processor spidered over his cortex.

Then, like Mirage appearing from thin air, Jazz appeared as a jack-mate in Punch's meta at the same time his grinning face leaned over Punch's shoulder and into his field of vision. "Heya there!"

Punch was granted enough physical control to vent a sigh of relief. Coming out from behind all cover meant that Jazz had declared him clear of tampering, viruses, sleeper code, and that he hadn't been attacked by anything when he'd cabled up. It was ALWAYS a good sign.

Punch smiled. "Hey."

Jazz's hand fell on Punch's shoulder, and Punch waited as the last of Jazz's scans and antivirals worked their way through his systems. He didn't realize he had motor control back until he realized he was leaning back on Jazz's lighter frame and the head of spec ops was chuckling at him. Jazz's laugh translated through his own light plating and Punch's own, thicker plates. "Miss me?" Jazz asked.

"Oh, yeah," Punch said, still smiling, still leaning.

"Business first," Jazz said, the request coming through the hardline for Punch's report. Punch dutifully shot him the encrypted packet he'd already prepared and waited while Jazz checked THAT with his antivirals, as well.

He knew that he'd passed when Jazz's data through the hardline turned far from professional, warm and familiar and intimate like an oil bath. ::You know, you're the only one I know who wants to let me this close. Something about me being a ruthless, manipulative saboteur….::

Punch shivered. ::You know why,:: he replied.

Because it was all true. Jazz was the most dangerous Autobot. Period. Weapon-laden frontliners, Omegas, Metroplex himself? No way. Too obvious. Too simple. Jazz, though...Jazz could be whoever he needed to be, find your weakness, rip you apart before you even knew he was there. Before he'd upped for officer, he'd been the Autobots' most successful mole and spy. When he'd been discovered, he'd gone one on one with Soundwave, convincing the 'Con spymaster that he was not only willing to be but valuable as a double agent. He'd played that game, dancing the line with a smile for vorns and vorns, until the 'Bots themselves had had to question who Jazz was really working for. Then he'd scraped and virus-spiked the 'Cons' central computer core, freed every high-level 'Bot he could get his hands on, and blew up half of Darkmount on his way out.

Jazz was good. He was so, so good, and that was why Punch needed him this close. Because he couldn't shake the feeling that he was a weapon with no way of telling whether his safety was still on. Because when Punch was unsure of himself, analyzing every blip and glitch and over-long recharge for signs of being compromised, when he worried that Counterpunch felt much too comfortable in his meta and that he was starting to lose himself….

::You know I'll catch ya,:: Jazz said, sliding around to Punch's front to stand plate-to-plate, the heat of him close but not as close as the reassuring cold steel of him twined in Punch's meta. ::No way you're gettin' past me.::

Some days, that was the only thing that kept Punch sane.


End file.
